Sen. Markwayne Mullin faces intense questioning at his DHS confirmation hearing

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+ Politics Sen. Markwayne Mullin faces intense questioning at his DHS confirmation hearing March 19, 20264:44 AM ET Heard on Morning Edition By Claudia Grisales , Leila Fadel Sen. Markwayne Mullin faces intense questioning at his DHS confirmation hearing Listen &middot; 3:50 3:50 Transcript Toggle more options Download Embed Embed "> <iframe src="https://www.npr.org/player/embed/nx-s1-5752242/nx-s1-9694823" width="100%" height="290" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" title="NPR embedded audio player"> Transcript Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin faced a difficult hearing on Wednesday on his nomination to lead the Department of Homeland Security. Sponsor Message LEILA FADEL, HOST: A Senate committee has voted this morning to advance the nomination of Oklahoma Republican Markwayne Mullin to become the next secretary of Homeland Security.

+ STEVE INSKEEP, HOST: People at the agency he would lead are working without pay as Democrats push for changes to immigration enforcement. The vote comes after a heated confrontation with the Senate Homeland Security Committee's Republican chairman, Rand Paul, who voted against him. FADEL: NPR congressional correspondent Claudia Grisales joins us now to explain. Good morning, Claudia. CLAUDIA GRISALES, BYLINE: Good morning, Leila. FADEL: OK. So Mullin seemed like he might have an easy path to confirmation, but instead, he's really off to a rocky start. What happened? GRISALES: Well, Mullin and Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, both Republicans, have a long-running personal beef. Earlier this year, Mullin called Paul a snake and said he understood why Paul was brutally attacked by a neighbor back in 2017. And that's how Paul kicked off Mullin's hearing yesterday. But Mullin, for his part, said he was ready to move past it. (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING) MARKWAYNE MULLIN: I can have difference of opinions with everybody in this room. But as secretary of Homeland, I'll be protecting everybody, including Kentucky, as much as I will my own backyard in Oklahoma. GRISALES: Mullin said he's laser-focused on bringing a new peace of mind to the agency in the wake of his dismissed predecessor, Kristi Noem, and her controversial tenure. FADEL: But Paul made the connection between their differences and Mullin's fitness for the job. GRISALES: Right. It was a big theme of his questioning. Here's Paul. (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING) RAND PAUL: Explain to the American public why they should trust a man with anger issues to set the proper example for ICE and Border Patrol agents. GRISALES: Now, Mullin rejected that accusation of anger issues, and he asked Paul to let him earn his respect. FADEL: But this issue of trust - that's something Democrats brought up as well, right? GRISALES: Right. Democrats took Mullin to task for his comments blaming two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, for their own deaths at the hands of immigration law enforcement officials. Mullin said he should have retracted those statements. But Michigan Democratic Senator Elissa Slotkin reminded him there's a lot of high stakes facing DHS. (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING) ELISSA SLOTKIN: There needs to be fundamental reform of this law enforcement agency, and I think that the public writ large is crying out for that. GRISALES: So it's a very different ballgame now because of the moment that DHS finds itself in. FADEL: So tell us more about Mullin. Why did President Trump nominate him to take Noem's place? GRISALES: Well, he's been a big Trump defender, particularly on immigration. He's also a first-term senator who describes himself as a family man who grew up in Westville, Oklahoma. He's a former MMA fighter. He's also an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, and he was elected to the House in 2012 and to the Senate a decade later. But he has faced his share of controversies in the Senate. FADEL: Yeah. Like what? GRISALES: So he's known for using violent rhetoric, and in a more serious moment, he challenged the leader of a union to a fight during a Senate hearing in 2023. And during yesterday's hearing, Democrats accused Mullin of withholding information in his nomination paperwork about his work with the military, but Mullin argued it was not required, since it overlapped his time as a House member. He's also facing questions over his family's stock portfolio. FADEL: But we know President Trump and Republican leaders have been able to get controversial nominees approved in the past. What do you expect comes next for Mullin? GRISALES: He could very well be on the Senate floor as early as next week and get confirmation then. And he's already talking about reforms, such as requiring federal immigration agents to use judicial warrants in some cases. So he's signaling that Republicans are ready to meet some of Democrats' demands to get those DHS workers paid again. FADEL: That's NPR's Claudia Grisales. Thank you for your reporting. GRISALES: Thank you. Copyright &copy; 2026 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information. Accuracy and availability of NPR transcripts may vary. Transcript text may be revised to correct errors or match updates to audio. Audio on npr.org may be edited after its original broadcast or publication. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record. 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